‘The trial cannot proceed,’ said the King in a very grave voice, ‘until all the jurymen are back in their proper places—all,’ he repeated with great emphasis, looking hard at Alice as he said do.

Alice looked at the jury-box, and saw that, in her haste, she had put the Lizard in head downwards, and the poor little thing was waving its tail about in a melancholy way, being quite unable to move. She soon got it out again, and put it right; ‘not that it signifies much,’ she said to herself; ‘I should think it would be quite as much use in the trial one way up as the other.’

As soon as the jury had a little recovered from the shock of being upset, and their slates and pencils had been found and handed back to them, they set to work very diligently to write out a history of the accident, all except the Lizard, who seemed too much overcome to do anything but sit with its mouth open, gazing up into the roof of the court.

‘If any one of them can explain it,’ said Alice, (she had grown so large in the last few minutes that she wasn’t a bit afraid of interrupting him,) ‘I’ll give him sixpence. I don’t believe there’s an atom of meaning in it.’

The jury all wrote down on their slates, ‘She doesn’t believe there’s an atom of meaning in it,’ but none of them attempted to explain the paper.

‘If there’s no meaning in it,’ said the King, ‘that saves a world of trouble, you know, as we needn’t try to find any. And yet I don’t know,’ he went on, spreading out the verses on his knee, and looking at them with one eye; ‘I seem to see some meaning in them, after all. “—said I could not swim—” you can’t swim, can you?’ he added, turning to the Knave.

The Knave shook his head sadly. ‘Do I look like it?’ he said. (Which he certainly did not, being made entirely of cardboard.)

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One of the jurors had a pencil that squeaked. This of course, Alice could not stand, and she went round the court and got behind him, and very soon found an opportunity of taking it away. She did it so quickly that the poor little juror (it was Bill, the Lizard) could not make out at all what had become of it; so, after hunting all about for it, he was obliged to write with one finger for the rest of the day; and this was of very little use, as it left no mark on the slate.

‘Herald, read the accusation!’ said the King.

On this the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and then unrolled the parchment scroll, and read as follows:—

This did not seem to encourage the witness at all: he kept shifting from one foot to the other, looking uneasily at the Queen, and in his confusion he bit a large piece out of his teacup instead of the bread-and-butter.

Just at this moment Alice felt a very curious sensation, which puzzled her a good deal until she made out what it was: she was beginning to grow larger again, and she thought at first she would get up and leave the court; but on second thoughts she decided to remain where she was as long as there was room for her.

All this time the Queen had never left off staring at the Hatter, and, just as the Dormouse crossed the court, she said to one of the officers of the court, ‘Bring me the list of the singers in the last concert!’ on which the wretched Hatter trembled so, that he shook both his shoes off.

Here one of the guinea-pigs cheered, and was immediately suppressed by the officers of the court. (As that is rather a hard word, I will just explain to you how it was done. They had a large canvas bag, which tied up at the mouth with strings: into this they slipped the guinea-pig, head first, and then sat upon it.)

Alice watched the White Rabbit as he fumbled over the list, feeling very curious to see what the next witness would be like, ‘—for they haven’t got much evidence yet,’ she said to herself. Imagine her surprise, when the White Rabbit read out, at the top of his shrill little voice, the name ‘Alice!’

‘Here!’ cried Alice, quite forgetting in the flurry of the moment how large she had grown in the last few minutes, and she jumped up in such a hurry that she tipped over the jury-box with the edge of her skirt, upsetting all the jurymen on to the heads of the crowd below, and there they lay sprawling about, reminding her very much of a globe of goldfish she had accidentally upset the week before.

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Alice had never been in a court of justice before, but she had read about them in books, and she was quite pleased to find that she knew the name of nearly everything there. ‘That’s the judge,’ she said to herself, ‘because of his great wig.’

The judge, by the way, was the King; and as he wore his crown over the wig, (look at the frontispiece if you want to see how he did it,) he did not look at all comfortable, and it was certainly not becoming.

‘And that’s the jury-box,’ thought Alice, ‘and those twelve creatures,’ (she was obliged to say ‘creatures,’ you see, because some of them were animals, and some were birds,) ‘I suppose they are the jurors.’ She said this last word two or three times over to herself, being rather proud of it: for she thought, and rightly too, that very few little girls of her age knew the meaning of it at all. However, ‘jury-men’ would have done just as well.

“The twelve jurors were all writing very busily on slates. ‘What are they doing?’ Alice whispered to the Gryphon. ‘They can’t have anything to put down yet, before the trial’s begun.’ ”

Sally Jefferson

‘They’re putting down their names,’ the Gryphon whispered in reply, ‘for fear they should forget them before the end of the trial.’

‘Stupid things!’ Alice began in a loud, indignant voice, but she stopped hastily, for the White Rabbit cried out, ‘Silence in the court!’ and the King put on his spectacles and looked anxiously round, to make out who was talking.

‘Stupid things!’ Alice began in a loud, indignant voice, but she stopped hastily, for the White Rabbit cried out, ‘Silence in the court!’ and the King put on his spectacles and looked anxiously round, to make out who was talking.

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‘I don’t think they play at all fairly,’ Alice began, in rather a complaining tone, ‘and they all quarrel so dreadfully one can’t hear oneself speak—and they don’t seem to have any rules in particular; at least, if there are, nobody attends to them—and you’ve no idea how confusing it is all the things being alive; for instance, there’s the arch I’ve got to go through next walking about at the other end of the ground—and I should have croqueted the Queen’s hedgehog just now, only it ran away when it saw mine coming!’

‘How do you like the Queen?’ said the Cat in a low voice.

‘Not at all,’ said Alice: ‘she’s so extremely—’ Just then she noticed that the Queen was close behind her, listening: so she went on, ‘—likely to win, that it’s hardly worth while finishing the game.’

Alice thought she might as well go back, and see how the game was going on, as she heard the Queen’s voice in the distance, screaming with passion. She had already heard her sentence three of the players to be executed for having missed their turns, and she did not like the look of things at all, as the game was in such confusion that she never knew whether it was her turn or not. So she went in search of her hedgehog.

The hedgehog was engaged in a fight with another hedgehog, which seemed to Alice an excellent opportunity for croqueting one of them with the other: the only difficulty was, that her flamingo was gone across to the other side of the garden, where Alice could see it trying in a helpless sort of way to fly up into a tree.

Alice waited till the eyes appeared, and then nodded. ‘It’s no use speaking to it,’ she thought, ‘till its ears have come, or at least one of them.’ In another minute the whole head appeared, and then Alice put down her flamingo, and began an account of the game, feeling very glad she had someone to listen to her. The Cat seemed to think that there was enough of it now in sight, and no more of it appeared.

‘I don’t think they play at all fairly,’ Alice began, in rather a complaining tone, ‘and they all quarrel so dreadfully one can’t hear oneself speak—and they don’t seem to have any rules in particular; at least, if there are, nobody attends to them—and you’ve no idea how confusing it is all the things being alive; for instance, there’s the arch I’ve got to go through next walking about at the other end of the ground—and I should have croqueted the Queen’s hedgehog just now, only it ran away when it saw mine coming!’

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LOVE IS… Saying Yes to the Mess

Do you remember the Velveteen Rabbit?  When the worn and torn up plush bunny realizes that being loved means being a little shabby.  Well, in the story of Christmas, God shows up with Love in Hand the shabbiest of places.  He chooses a simple young girl to be his vessel to house His Saving Son.  This child arrives into a sticky and messy situation with a confused husband-to-be and questions all around.  And of course that manger scene… It couldn’t be more messy.   All these things were God’s version of true love.  It was one giant mess of a situation, but Mary said YES to it.   I wonder sometimes: How did she do it? She must have turned her focus on the little bundle of LOVE that sat right smack dab in the middle of it in order to get through.  She did not focus on the dirt and the crowded stable, she had to focus on what mattered most and that was the LOVE and her faith in God’s support along the way.

Raising children is a messy business.  Sticky table tops, crunched up pieces of cookie on the floor of your car.  Just think about what your Christmas morning living room will look like… not to mention all the messy sibling squabbles you are going to have to deal with over the next few weeks of break and what about all the sick kids at your house…

OH THE MESS!!!

But here’s the deal:  You’ve said YES to all this.  You’ve made the choice to enter into the messiest of lives and if you can do it with joy and peace and understanding it can be the greatest version of love.  Hang tight through the mess letting it go a little.   Try focussing on the love that sits right smack dab in the middle of it… and keep in mind they are growing and learning and need your support along the way.

LOVE IS …  A Constant that cannot be undone

Just like the Veleteen Rabbit learned once your real you will always be real.  Once Love shows up it does not shift or change.  God again shows us this through Christmas.  There is no give and take of HIS love… it is all give and we continue to be the recipient of this love year after year  no matter what… NO MATTER WHAT!   That little phrase means so much and helps to show LOVE in that steady constant stream that does not ebb or flow with negative or positive emotion but stays the course and never ends.  

This kind of love is the same we have for our own children.  Yes of course there are behaviors and situations surrounding our children that we cannot stand but the LOVE part… it stays steady.  You cannot change it.  It isn’t an emotion that runs high or low depending on the moment.  It is long living, never changing and just there… NO MATTER WHAT.  Knowing this helps us keep our emotions at bay and helps us to deal more matter of factly with the ups and downs that come our way.

So that’s it…Love is a Constant and Love is a Mess…

You might be saying… “Love is a Constant Mess”.

I say, “I’ll take it!”

Although things will shift from toddlers with sticky fingers to teen-agers with sticky situations the mess goes on.   I will keep steady keeping my emotions in check and knowing that I love them no matter what  just as God has shown me His LOVE through the gifts of Christmas that go on and on.

Through my family’s growing years, my house will not be perfectly clean, my bank account will not be overflowing, and my nights will be a little more sleepless.   These things shall pass and I will survive.   But the steady stream of LOVE and LEARNING that we pass on to our children will go on and on reaching into the far depths of our family’s future.

Know that Child in Bloom is constantly here to help you as you work through your family’s growing years.  Don’t go it alone… contact Child in Bloom to get the support you need and make the most of your mess

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